


The Gang Buys a Bar

by queenspacegay



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-02
Updated: 2018-11-25
Packaged: 2019-08-14 11:31:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16491761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenspacegay/pseuds/queenspacegay
Summary: “Okay so, hear me out, what if we,” Charlie paused to belch loudly, “what if we bought that bar,”“Don’t be ridiculous dude, what are you talking about,” Mac said, laughing into his mug.“Woah, woah hold up there a second, pal,” Dennis clumsily placed a hand on Mac’s shoulder, the dusty lightbulb in his brain flickering to life, “jus’ think about it for a sec’; we’d get to be our own bosses, free booze, hot chicks on tap, I think it’s a fantastic idea,” He pointed at Charlie approvingly.“You think we could do it?” Mac’s eyes were wide and his lips stained red from the wine.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at NaNo so I'm only aiming for 25K words rather than 50K as my life is all a bit up in the air rn so I'm not sure how much time I'll be able to dedicate to writing. I won't be updating this every day but hopefully every few days - I have a lot of the story planned out but it will be uploaded in rough draft form rather than properly edited, I guess I'll come back and do that when December comes around.

_3pm, July 16th, 1998,_  
_on a Thursday_   
_Penn State University Eastview Terrace Halls of Residence_

  
Graduation crept up on Dennis, springing out of nowhere after what felt like no time at all rather than what had been 3 whole years. It was as if this whole time he’d been watching where his feet were landing, but when he looked up to see where his next step would fall, he’d run out of pavement without noticing and was seconds away from plummeting off a cliff.

Though maybe not quite so dramatic, he had his dad’s credit card to catch him after all. He wasn’t entirely thrilled by the prospect of having to get a full time adult job however.

It dawned on him, one lazy summer afternoon spent with Mac, who was visiting just as he did almost every weekend, that he really didn’t want to move back in with his parents in just a few short weeks’ time.

“I don’t think I could stand living with Dee again,” Dennis said, breath stirring the faint haze of smoke coating the air.

“God no, she looks like a bird,” Mac added another lungful of smoke to the room. 

Dennis laughed, looking fondly over at Mac who was stretched out on the soft sheets of his twin bed, joint held loosely between his fingers, totally blissed out on the comfortable mattress. He was half convinced Mac visited for his mattress rather than to see him. Dennis himself was propped against the headboard, one leg thrown over Mac’s lap and an ashtray balanced precariously atop his knee between them.

“I gotta get my own place too, I love my mom but I can’t really take chicks back to bang when she’s there smoking in the living room when we get back every time,” Mac said.

There were other reasons Mac was having trouble finding chicks to bang, Dennis thought idly. Then a thought struck him, he sat up abruptly and grabbed Mac’s shirtsleeve to get his attention.

“Bro this is perfect,”

“What is?” Mac was still watching the ceiling as if that was more interesting than the revelation Dennis had just had.

“Right hear me out, you want out of your mom’s house, right? And I would rather off myself than live with Dee again,”

“Who wouldn’t,”

“So, let’s get a place together!”

“Bro!” Mac sat up too, finally snapped out of his haze, and gazed at Dennis in awe, “That’s an awesome idea! Do you really think we could?”

“I don’t see why not, I mean I have enough savings for a deposit and I’m sure we can manage after that,”

“Dude that’s perfect!”

“Just picture it!” Dennis said, leaning back against the headboard once more, fingers trailing absently down Mac’s arm as he did so. “No stupid sisters or parents getting in our way, just us and the babes.”

“Us and the babes,” Mac echoed, eyes glazed. God, he was high as shit.

“We could do all those things we’ve always talked about doing but never have time for. We could do movie nights!”

“Oh, bro! That’d be awesome! We keep saying we’re gonna watch Predator but we never get around to it. And we still haven’t gotten around to Blade, oh and we need to catch The Matrix while it’s still in theatres!”

“Yeah, okay,” Dennis patted Mac reassuringly on the shoulder before he launched into a full tirade about all the films they hadn’t seen yet. “Ah man, this is gonna be so great.” He sighed, swiping the joint out of Mac’s pliant fingers and taking a long drag. 

 

“You boneheads aren’t gonna last a month,” Dee sneered from her spot leaning against a doorframe being decidedly unhelpful watching Dennis and Mac unpack cardboard boxes into their new living room.

“Don’t you have anything better to do than stand around being irritating? Begone! Get out of our apartment!”

“Yeah, beat it, bird,”

“What?” Dee said, looking confused but suitably affronted.

“Oh, it’s cos you look like a bird, which, you do,” Dennis explained. “Now leave us,” He said, shooing her with his hand.

“Ugh whatever, have fun playing happy families,” Dee said, finally leaving Mac and Dennis in peace.

“God, I thought she’d never leave,” Mac groaned, flopping down on the second hand, already worn out leather sofa in the middle of the room. Dennis joined him with a sigh, electing to use a cardboard box as a foot rest rather than drag the newly assembled coffee table over to its correct home. 

The mid-July heat was oppressive. They’d thrown the windows open in a weak attempt to get a breeze through the new apartment but it had barely helped at all. Dennis decided that moving house during the summer was the worst idea he’d ever had and vowed to never do it again.

The apartment was perfect, just ten minutes down the road from Charlie’s mum’s place where he still resided, and was also only a few blocks away from Mac’s mom’s house; a downright requirement of any suitable living space, Mac had declared when looking for apartments, as he needed to be able to check up on her whenever.

“She misses me when I’m not home,” He explained, “I need to make sure she’s going to be alright on her own without me, you know?”

Mrs. Mac had grunted in…agreement? Dennis could never tell.

But this meant that the pair already knew their way around town, so Dennis wasn’t complaining. He was still close enough to home to have easy access to Frank’s card, whenever he was in the country, and that’s all that mattered to him.

“Dude, do we have any beer?” Dennis certainly didn’t whine.

“Nope, we don’t have jack shit in the fridge,”

Dennis groaned, throwing his head back against the sofa cushions dramatically and regretting it as his sweaty neck stuck to the cheap leather uncomfortably. 

“This is torture, I will literally live here for the rest of my life if it means I never have to do this again,”

“I feel you bro. Hey, you wanna go out and get a drink?”

“God, yes. If I don’t get a cold beer soon I’m gonna get heatstroke,”

“Exactly, we’ve gotta stay hydrated,” Mac agreed enthusiastically. “Hey, I’ll ring Charlie, see if he wants to join,”

“Yeah sure man, whatever,”

Dennis wasn’t close with Charlie, but the three of them had formed a weird little trio by the end of high school which had somehow never disbanded when he’d left for college, leaving them behind living at their respective mother’s houses still.

Mac and Dennis had briefly considered inviting Charlie to live with them, however logic had won out when Dennis pointed out that Charlie’s bedroom always smelled faintly (and sometimes not so faintly) of a weird and disgusting mix of weed, piss, and paint fumes. Mac had agreed that he’d rather not have to put up with that 24/7, actually.

 

“Are you kidding me?!”  
Mac, Charlie and Dennis stood in the burning sun outside their favourite local pub, to find it boarded up with a ‘For Sale’ sign nailed to the door.

“This is a disgrace!” Dennis cried, throwing his arms in the air. “The hottest day of the year and they’ve closed the best bar in Philadelphia!”

“It’s an outrage!” Charlie agreed.

“Who authorized this? I want to speak to someone about- with no warning too! I could get heatstroke, I could die,”

“Ah whatever man, it’s too hot for this,” Mac whined, “Let’s just go buy beer and order a takeout and chill at home,”

“You know what, this still sucks but I do like that idea,” Dennis agreed begrudgingly, clapping Mac on the shoulder.

 

The three of them ended up sprawled on the rug in Mac and Dennis’ living room, leaning up against still packed boxes for lack of couch space and eating Chinese out of the containers off the floor. They’d started the night out drinking beer to cool down and rehydrate from the long stressful day, but around the time the sun went down switched to red wine, deciding to celebrate the new apartment.

Charlie swigged wine straight out of the bottle, hiccupping slightly, while Mac drank his from a mug and Dennis from a pint glass stolen from one of his asshole flat mates back at Penn. Another three empty wine bottles lay discarded amongst the crushed beer cans.

“Okay so, hear me out, what if we,” Charlie paused to belch loudly, “what if we bought that bar,”

“Don’t be ridiculous dude, what are you talking about,” Mac said, laughing into his mug.

“Woah, woah hold up there a second, pal,” Dennis clumsily placed a hand on Mac’s shoulder, the dusty lightbulb in his brain flickering to life, “jus’ think about it for a sec’; we’d get to be our own bosses, free booze, hot chicks on tap, I think it’s a fantastic idea,” He pointed at Charlie approvingly.

“You think we could do it?” Mac’s eyes were wide and his lips stained red from the wine. Dennis had the strange urge to wipe it away with his thumb. He still hadn’t removed his hand and Mac glanced down at it quickly before looking back up at Dennis, eyes full of that same awe as when he’d suggested living together.

“I think we should do it, we practically have a moral obligation to at this point,” Dennis said, only slurring his words a little. “Where else are the poor, poor people of South Philly meant to drink otherwise? And just think about the babes,”

“He has a point,” Charlie nodded seriously, pointing with his half full wine bottle, splashing little droplets everywhere.

“You do make a good point,” Mac said. Dennis’ hand slipped away from his shoulder finally and he furrowed his brow slightly, taking another swig of wine. “But none of us know shit about running a bar,” He said finally.

“Well how hard can it really be?” Dennis laughed, “I mean if the idiots who were there before could do it,”

“Didn’t they go bust and are now selling that bar?” Charlie interjected.

“Exactly my friend, we can do a better job than that.” Dennis said triumphantly, leaning back against the sofa and taking a long drink. His friends nodded in agreement at his excellent argument.

 

The next day found the trio singing legal documents in a run-down solicitor’s office. Dennis had just enough left over in his savings and Mac had earnt enough doing god knows what while Dennis had been at college, probably selling drugs like his dad or working a shitty job cleaning toilets. Dennis hadn’t really asked about Mac’s life back home whenever he’d visited and Mac had been happy not to talk about it.

Charlie had also somehow managed to scrape together enough to pitch into the deposit. Dennis assumed either illegal practices or begging his mother were involved, probably the latter. He suspected Charlie didn’t have a clue what he was signing; he didn’t appear to be reading any of it and the vague scribble he was passing off as a signature changed drastically each time he wrote it. From what Dennis could figure, he was writing some variation of “CHOL” but the solicitor hadn’t seemed to notice so he kept quiet.

Mere hours later, the three of them were stood outside a run-down bar in South Philadelphia, a set of keys clutched in each of their hands.

“Are you sure this was a good idea?” Mac worried, looking to Dennis for reassurance, of course.

“Oh, hell yeah, baby. This is gonna be awesome!”

 

It was not, in fact, awesome. Mac’s key took some jiggling before it clicked open and he swung the door open dramatically to reveal a dingy, run down bar. Grime covered every surface, there were ominous stains on the floor, and broken stools upended near the bar. Dennis was pretty sure he saw a rat scurry into a hole in the wall.

“Ah man this is great!” Charlie exclaimed, hightailing it inside.

“Charlie this place is a shithole,” Mac groaned, flipping the lights on.

“Nah, we clean it up, fix the stools, maybe get some decorations up, it’ll be sweet,” Dennis said reasonably.

“Hey, I was thinking we could go with the whole Irish bar thing, you know, like St. Peter and stuff!” Said Charlie.

“You, my friend, are thinking of St. Patrick, patron saint of booze,” said Mac.

“I’m not sure that’s what he was saint of but I am liking where this is going. Get a couple of four leaf clovers up, maybe some green lighting or something. The outside of the bar’s already green, this could work!”

“We could call it St. Paddy’s! Get a proper sign up and everything!”

“Yes, Mac!” Dennis threw an arm round Mac’s shoulders in glee, patting his chest with his free hand, “That’s perfect! Though lose the ‘Saint,’ what about just ‘Paddy’s Pub’? Make it a proper Irish bar,” He held his hand out, picturing the sign.

“I like that dude!” Charlie yelled from where he was now rummaging behind the bar. “Hey, there’s some beer back here still!”

“Charlie that beer’s probably years old,” Mac berated him.

“Oh, I’ll just drink it alone then,”

“No, shut up toss me one,”

Charlie uncapped three beers and slid them down the bar to Mac and Dennis, or at least, attempted to. The first he didn’t push nearly hard enough and didn’t even make it half way, so he shoved the other harder and it tipped over, skidding to the end of the bar and spilling foaming liquid everywhere.

“Goddammit Charlie!” Mac cried, jumping back and grabbing the beer before it could roll off the edge of the bar.

“Oh, I’m sorry! I’ve never bartended before I’m so sorry I’m not instantly perfect, please forgive me!” Charlie yelled.

“Alright, alright, calm down,” Dennis said, holding a hand out appealingly. “Maybe your place isn’t behind the bar, I did a bit of bartending at college so clearly I should be the one doing that. Charlie, aren’t you wondering what you could find in the basement? You could be in charge of clearing that out and you can keep whatever you find down there,”

“Oh shit, you think there could be treasure?”

“Maybe!” Charlie turned and practically sprinted towards the stairs leading to the basement, a huge grin plastered on his face.

“And Mac–”

“I’ll be head of security,” Mac said, crossing his arms and tipping his head back in a way he thought made him look menacing. “I’m the strongest and most skilled in here and this is a rough patch of Philly, you’re all safe as long as I’m here,” He threw out a few sloppy karate chops and a high kick with an extremely bent knee to prove his point.

“Right, sure,” Dennis said, deciding it was easier to just humour his friend’s delusions. “But for now, we should probably get the bar cleaned up, we’ll never attract customers with it in this state,”

“Okay, I hear what you’re saying but I think it’s more important we get the décor right, it really needs to feel like an Irish Catholic bar or it’s not gonna work right,”

“Okay firstly it’s not an Irish Catholic bar, it’s just an Irish bar, but I like what you’re saying. We leave Charlie here and go buy decorations?”

“Exactly bro!”

“Nice! You think Charlie will be fine if we just leave him,”

“Yeah, we’ll just leave him and go, keep up the good work buddy!” Mac called over his shoulder as they made a hasty exit.  

 

“Hey, dude, what if we got tassels for the ceiling?”

“Tassels?”

“Yeah, like, going with the green and yellow theme okay, look at these,” He held up a pack of green plastic decorative tassels, “hang these from the rafters, alternating colours green and yellow. Bring a bit of life into the bar! Everyone always forgets about the ceiling but it’s an important part of the decoration,”

“Sweet, chuck it in the cart dude,” Mac dumped several packs of the tassels in the cart along with the tins of green and yellow paint, a fluorescent shamrock sign, and a dartboard.

“Okay so I was thinking,” Dennis said, “String up a couple of these bad boys, distract from the inevitably poor paint job, give the illusion of class, what do you think?” Dennis held up a string of fairy lights.

“Bro, I’m excellent at painting walls, the paint job is gonna be flawless, and don’t you think it’s a little girly?”

“Nah dude, it’ll attract the chicks,” Dennis said. Bringing up chicks was a surefire way to get Mac to agree with any idea ha came up with.

“Oh well if it’ll attract the chicks,” Mac was too easy, Dennis thought.

They spent the whole afternoon trawling the shops and adding random decor to their baskets. They ended up spending way over their budget, but it was worth it, no one wants to drink in an ugly bar. 

The next few days were chaos. The three of them somehow managed to pull together and coordinate themselves enough to decorate the bar. Mac painted the walls, even bought painters tape and everything! The tables and benches were fixed in place though so he had to clamber over them to get to the far side wall and ended up absolutely covered in paint but did a surprisingly good job nevertheless. Dennis oversaw the décor and spent a good three hours up a ladder attaching the ridiculous tassels Mac had picked out, and screwing on the new green lightshades. Charlie had enthusiastically got to work cleaning the place from top to bottom. Dennis wasn’t sure letting the kid near chemicals was the best idea but he also didn’t want to have to do that job himself so he didn’t argue it and he seemed to be doing a surprisingly thorough job of it.

Three days after buying the place, Paddy’s Pub was a real-life bar, with plenty of alcohol, a musty pool table, a light up ‘CLOSED’ sign, and stupid tassels hanging from the badly painted rafters. The three of them were exhausted, slumped into a booth strewn with empty beer bottles and upended shot glasses.

“To Paddy’s Pub!” Dennis said, raising a shot glass in the air clumsily and only spilling a little bit onto the already sticky table. “The best bar in Philadelphia,”

“Paddy’s pub!” The others echoed tiredly, and the three of them slammed back the shots.

“Ah shit,” Charlie said suddenly.

“What?” Said Mac.

“Well now we’ve gotta like, what, run the place? God that sounds like a lot of work I’m not sure that’s what I signed up for,”

“It’s exactly what you signed up for!” Dennis cried.

“Hm, I don’t think it is,” Charlie said, his eyes now closed and head propped on his hand. “Can’t we just, I dunno, pay someone to do it for us?”

“With what money?” But Charlie was already snoring softly against his hand.

“Y’know, he’s got a point though,” Dennis conceded, turning to Mac.

“Yeah, I don’ really wanna like, work,”

“We should hire a waitress with really huge breasts,”

“I call dibs!”

“You can’t call dibs it was my idea!”

“Technically, it was Charlie’s idea,”

 


	2. Chapter 2

“I hear you jackassess are looking for a new bartender,” Was Dee’s greeting as she burst into the bar the next day. Charlie, Mac and Dennis all winced at the sudden loud noise, noise cutting through their hangovers.

“Christ, Dee. Would you keep it down?” Dennis said. “And yes, we’re looking for another bartender to help out around here, but that’s not gonna be you,”

“Oh yeah? And why not?”

“Because we hate you,” Mac yelled. Charlie punched him on the arm and covered his eyes.

“If you people don’t stop your screeching I will burn this bar to the ground, don’t test me I’ll do it!” Charlie yelled.

“You set this bar on fire and I will make absolutely certain the cops will never find your body,” Dennis growled.

“Alright, alright, no one’s setting fire to anything or killing anyone and no one’s hiring Dee,” Mac reasoned.

“That’s so not fair!” Dee complained, “I’m your sister, Dennis!”

“Yeah, and why in the hell would that make me want to hire you? You’re insufferable,”

“Oh, and you think you have any chance of finding someone insane enough to work with you assholes?”

“See this is exactly why no one will hire you, all that sass and backtalk, Dee you’re impossible to work with.” Dennis snapped. “Now get out of my bar,”

“Yeah, get out of our bar before I make you get out,” Mac said, puffing up his chest and tilting his head back. Dennis rolled his eyes at the weak show of intimidation but glared at Dee all the same.

“Fine, fuck you guys. This bar’s gonna fail anyway, no one’s gonna want to drink at the shittiest pub in Philly,” She turned tail and stalked out the door.

“She doesn’t know what she’s goddamn talking about,” Dennis said, glaring after her. “Shittest bar in Philly,” He laughed, “Goddamn bird.”

“She is right though, we do need to start looking for a new waitress, we’re almost done with renovations, I reckon we’ll be able to open in a few days,” Mac reasoned.

“God, do we have to wait that long? The bar looks fine let’s just open today,”

“I’m gonna have to stop you there,” Charlie said, holding up a hand to quiet Dennis. He glared at it. “There’s no way this bar is up to spec yet, I still need to clean the pipes under the bar, and sort the keg room out, and there’s a whole infestation of rats I need to deal with before we can even think about opening,”

Dennis groaned and dropped his head into his hands, “This bar is turning into such an annoyance!”

“Come on Den, it’ll just take a few days. We need to sort out our liquor license and suppliers and stuff anyway, we can’t just open because we’ve decorated,” Mac rubbed Dennis’ shoulder, trying to console him.

 

"I'm tired of cleaning," Dennis declared, sitting back on his heels from where he'd been scrubbing at one of the unidentified stains on the wooden floor. 

"Yeah me too, can we go get dinner?" Mac said, setting down his paintbrush and wiping his hands on his shirt, smearing white paint all over it. 

"Hey, let's say we go to Dave & Busters, I hear their steak is marvelous,"

"Fuck yeah, let's do it!"

"I'm gonna stay behind if you don't mind, fellas," Charlie said, popping up from his spot scrubbing pipes behind the bar. "I've got more cleaning to get done,"

"Are you sniffing cleaning supplies, Charlie?" Mac said. 

"No," 

"Charlie, you can't sniff cleaning supplies, that shit'll mess you up!"

"Yeah, I hear you, I hear you,"

"You say that but I don't think you're gonna stop,"

"I hear you, I get you,"

"Charlie are you high right now?"

"I get what you're saying man, you know, this cleaning stuff is some strong shit. It'll get you all like ahh, I get you man,"

Mac looked like he was going to carry on arguing with Charlie so Dennis stepped in; "Okay well we're gonna head off then, Charlie stop huffing cleaning supplies,"

"I gotcha," Charlie said, throwing a lazy finger gun in Dennis' general direction. Mac showed signs of wanting to stay and argue some more so Dennis put a guiding hand on the small of his back and gave a gentle shove towards the door. 

 

"Where do you even look to find a waitress?" Dennis asked over the noise of ski ball machines and chatter. 

"I don't know man, we gotta make sure they're busty enough too, we've gotta set the standard for the type of women we want at the bar,"

"Obviously they have to be busty," Dennis agreed, "that's a given,"

"Well what about the waitresses here? I'm sure they'd like a career change. Hey-" He grabbed the attention of a nearby waitress. 

"What can I get you boys?"

"We'd like to offer you a fantastic opportunity," Mac started, glancing over at Dennis with that stupid grin of his plastered over his face, "To work for us!"

"I'm sorry, I don't-" She started before Dennis cut her off. 

"You see we've just opened a bar in South Philly, and we're looking to hire a waitress," Dennis eyed her up and down, switching to his most seductive tone of voice and biting his lip, "and we were wondering if you'd be interested in joining the, ah, team,"

"I'm sorry," She said, smiling politely, "I'm not looking to change jobs right now,"

"Look, it's not a change in jobs! It's simply an opportunity to, uh, improve the work you're currently doing! Don't you ever get tired of working for some big faceless corporation," Dennis had lowered his voice conspiratorially, "we're just a couple of dudes! Good looking dudes at that, lots of tips, free booze, the works!"

"Look I'm not interested," She said sternly, smile dropping, "can I take your order?"

"Ugh, fine, we'll take two steaks," Dennis said, snapping back to a normal tone and glaring down at his menu. 

"Coming right up." The waitress wasn't even pretending to be polite anymore, and practically stormed off to the kitchen. 

Mac eyed Dennis warily and looked down at his own menu, despite not needing to order now. 

"Sheesh what was her problem?" Dennis said, ditching his menu and reaching for his glass of red wine. 

"I dunno, maybe waitresses who already have jobs is the wrong place to be looking, man. We need waitresses who are desperate enough to work wherever,"

"Okay, I think I can see where this is going. So what, we go down to the welfare store and see if we can pick us up a couple of chicks there?"

"I dunno man, that seems pretty seedy. I mean we don't wanna end up with a hooker working at the bar,"

"Why not? Huge breasted woman pulling drinks, what could go wrong?"

"Ugh, she'll always be ditching work to go bang some dude and I just don't want that kind of crowd in our bar, it's supposed to be a classy establishment," Mac said, swilling his wine around his glass as if he knew anything of class at all. "We could always post a sign outside the bar that says we're looking for staff?" He suggested. 

"God holding interviews sounds like so much work I don't wanna do that,"

"No, no one does," Mac said pensively. Then he gasped, "Okay so bro, hear me out," his face got all pinched in the way it got whenever he proposed something he knew Dennis didn’t want to hear. Dennis hated that face, it made him angry before the words even came out of Mac’s mouth.

"Oh god,"

"No, this is a good idea honest, just hear me out,"

"Nothing good you have ever said has started with the phrase 'just hear me out',"

Mac completely ignored him and plowed on anyway. "What if we hired sweet Dee? I know she’s the worst,” He said quickly before Dennis could start yelling, “but we wouldn’t have to pay her minimum wage, we could scam her into working for less if she gets some bullshit benefit, like we’ll give her rights to merchandising! Bars don’t merchandize she’ll never see a penny but if we tell her she will she’s totally dumb enough to go for it!”

“You’re proposing scamming my sister for free labour?” Dennis said. Mac looked nervous.

“Yeah, I guess, I mean-”

“Mac, I love it. That dumb bitch is stupid enough to sign anything, and she’s desperate to feel like a part of the gang, let’s do it.”   
 

 

“Okay Sweet Dee, we thought it over, and we’d like to offer you the job of waitress,” Dennis announced proudly from behind the bar.

“Really?” Dee said, grin splitting her face.

“Yeah, all you have to do is sign this contract,” Dee’s face instantly changed into a look of suspicion.

“What’s the catch,” She said, snatching the piece of paper Dennis was offering her.

“Well we’re certainly not offering health insurance that’s for starters,” Dennis laughed. She scanned through the contract quickly.

“Five dollars an hour? Dennis minimum wage is five fifteen!”

“Yeah but you’re family,” He reasoned, “so minimum wage doesn’t apply,”

“Yes, it does dickwad, that’s only if they’re your kid,”

“Don’t think that’s right,” Dennis said, glancing at Mac who shrugged unhelpfully. “But regardless, you’re getting five dollars an hour. However, you'll be receiving seventy five percent of the merchandising profits,"

"A hundred," She shot back.

"A hundred?! That's absurd, that's ridiculous how could you propose such a thing,"

"If I'm going to be working for minimum wage I want all of the merchandising rights."

Dennis opened his mouth to start shouting but Mac placed a hand on his shoulder. 

"Dennis," He warned, "Can I talk to you for a second?"

Dennis glared but followed him to the back office.

"What, Mac?"

"Den, who cares if she gets a hundred percent of the merchandising rights?!"

"It's the principle! How can she just march in here and expect to take- a hundred per- it's absolutely absurd!"

"Dennis she's not going to be getting anything! Would you chill out," 

Dennis glared at him but Mac stared straight back. After a moment he conceded, and stormed back out to the bar. 

"Fine, a hundred percent of merchandising, but we only pay you four fifty,"

"Four fourty five," She shot back. Dennis wanted to hit something.

"Fine!" He ground out, snatching the contract from Dee's claw-like hands, making the proper amendments, and thrusting it back to her. She signed it, that insufferably smug look of hers tugging unattractively at her mouth and eyebrow.

"A pleasure doing business with you, brother dear." He resisted the urge to snarl at her.

 

Before they knew it, they’d run out of reasons to stall the opening of the bar. Suddenly the prospect of running a functional business seemed very real, Dennis was having déjà vu to a week before graduation again, the feeling of tripping over his own feet as he hurtled towards a finish line he had forgotten was there. 

“We need to do something big for opening night,” Dennis decided, “Something to draw customers in, y’know, let them know this is a happening bar,”

“Oh, yeah like a birthday party,” Charlie said. 

“What? No that’s- where did that even come from what are you talking about?”

“Well like, the bar’s born right, and it can’t have a first birthday and be born without a birthday party,” 

Dennis pinched the bridge of his nose. 

“Your first birthday isn’t on the day you’re born, Charlie,” Dee said. 

“Do you even know what’s happening here?” Dennis said, trying not to raise his voice in frustration. 

“Uh, yeah. We need to celebrate the bar being born and invite everyone in Philly so we get more customer people,” 

“That’s not actually a terrible- that’s not bad,” Mac said. Dennis sighed. Once Mac was on board with one of Charlie’s harebrained schemes it was over for him really. Might as well just strap in and enjoy the ride. 

“So, you want us to throw a birthday party for the bar?”

“Well maybe, people do opening parties all the time – this is way more original!” Mac reasoned. 

“Alright, fine. Have it your way. We’re throwing a birthday party for the goddamn bar.”

 

“How do you even throw a party for a bar?” Charlie said, staring at the shelves of brightly coloured paper and plastic decorations in front of them. 

“How do you- Charlie this was your idea!”

“Was it? I feel like it was Mac’s, man,”

“No, dude, it was definitely Dennis’, he was all talking about how we had to do something big for the opening night,”

“Yes, but I would never have come up with something as idiotic as giving it a birthday party,”

“Alright guys, I think we’re getting a little off topic,” Charlie said, “Is the bar a boy or a girl?”

“What?” Mac and Dennis said in unison. 

“Well we’ve gotta know what the gender is so we can get the proper bunting,” He said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, holding up a packet of pink bunting in one hand that spelled out “Congratulations, It’s A Girl!” and a blue boy’s version in the other. 

“It’s a building, Charlie! It doesn’t have a gender,” Dennis said, at the exact time Mac confidently said, “Boy.”

“What?” Dennis said, turning to Mac. 

“Well clearly the bar would be a boy,” 

“He’s got a point!” Charlie said, tossing the blue bunting into the cart. 

“None of this is making any sense,” Dennis declared, mostly to himself as the other two were lost causes at this point.

 

Not a single person turned up to Paddy’s Pub’s Birthday Party. The four of them sat dejectedly round the end of the bar, nursing beers in somber quiet. Dennis couldn’t say he was surprised but he was a little disappointed. They’d all had so much hope riding on this bar that to see it fail on its very first night was more than a little disheartening. 

“You know whose fault this is?” Dee said, breaking the silence, “that bar down the street that just opened up last month; The Triangle Tavern. It’s totally blowing up our spot,”

“You’re right, Dee,” Dennis said, “We have to go over there and do something about this,”

 

“This is such a sweet idea bro,” Mac said, checking the alley for signs of life, “no way they’ll miss the message now!”

Dennis laughed in agreement, shaking a spray paint can, and started spraying a fuzzy line over the door of their target, the red paint dribbling over his fingertips as he worked.  

The plan was simple really, the bar down the road had been stealing all their customers, so they were spray painting the words “HATE WOMEN” over the front door, meaning no woman could possibly want to drink there since the establishment was clearly no safe place for them. So instead they would come to Paddy’s, and with no women at this bar, the men would flock to follow them, meaning the gang would steal all this shitty pub’s customers, and scam all the liberal yuppies concerned with bullshit like safety out of some sweet, sweet cash.

“Man, I cannot wait to see Dee’s face when she sees I was right,” Mac mused.

“Now hey, hey hang on there a second buddy, what do you mean when she sees you were right?” Dennis says, abandoning his methodical painting to turn and stare reproachfully at Mac.

“Well, you know, since it was my idea and all,”

“Your idea?” Dennis started, voice ticking up an octave dangerously, “I can’t believe you think this was actually-”

“Bro do we have to do this every time? Of course this was my idea, I was the one who pointed out this place was stealing all of our customers in the first place!” “Bullshit and you know it dude, anyway, I was the one who suggested flushing them out, so really the plan was my idea,”

“If anyone who’s not me is gonna take any kind of credit it should be Charlie for suggesting the spray paint!”

“That’s ludicrous! He didn’t come up with the plan he just wanted to huff paint!”

“Which is what gave me the idea to-”

“Hold- hold on a sec shut up,” Dennis said, holding out both hands to shush Mac.

“Don’t try and deflect me because you know I’m right!” Mac said indignantly, pointing an accusing finger at Dennis.

“No dumbass, I hear sirens,”

They both stood stock still, listening hard. Blue lights started flashing at the end of the road.

“Oh shit, what if they see us? What do we do?” Mac said in a strangled voice.

“Just follow my lead,” Dennis said, voice low and eyes turning dark. He didn’t even give Mac time to process what was going on before he grabbed his face in his hands and pulled him sharply into a kiss. Dennis’ back bumped against the wall and Mac braced himself against it with one hand, the other instinctually going to his waist, not even hesitating to kiss back, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Dennis deepened the kiss, tracing his tongue over Mac’s lower lip and licking past into his mouth. Mac pressed Dennis up harder against the cold brick wall, dragging an unexpected low noise from the back of Dennis’ throat. 

Something seemed to click in Mac’s brain at the sound and suddenly his hand was snaking up Dennis’ shirt and he was kissing back with more intensity, almost like he had something to prove. He pulled Dennis impossibly closer, rocking their hips together slightly and Dennis’ hand dropped to his waist, clinging tightly to his shirt. 

Kissing Mac should feel foreign and wrong, Dennis thinks, but somehow it almost felt familiar. Like they’d been doing this their whole lives. He could feel Mac’s heart thrumming through the thin, worn out material of his shirt.  
Dennis’ mind was completely blank, every sense was dominated by Mac. The taste of beer on his lips mixed faintly with the cherry lip balm Mac had stolen from Dennis’ glove compartment last week. The smell of his aftershave, much cheaper and tackier than Dennis’ own but so familiar and Mac. The feel of his lithe fingers twisting in the hair at the nape of his neck. The slight breathy noises He made every time Dennis rocked their hips minutely further together.

Mac bit Dennis’ lip and he let out a puff of warm breath into the shared space between them, his hips rocking forward ever so slightly. Mac tightened the grip on his hip, catching a moan in his throat before it could escape

Just as he thought he couldn’t remember a time before he was kissing Mac, and couldn’t imagine a time when he would no longer be, Mac pulled away slightly, leaning his forehead against his cheek and panting slightly for just a moment before pulling away properly.

Every fiber of Dennis’ being wanted to chase after Mac, crowd him up against the wall and continue kissing him, but instead Mac took an awkward step back, hand that had been clinging to his hip for dear life shooting up to rub the back of his neck so as not to leave it hanging uncomfortably between them. Something had snapped him back to reality, and Dennis was thrown along for the ride, left stood there trying not to look like he was gasping for breath.

“Uh, what was that?” Mac said rather bluntly, as if he hadn’t been kissing Dennis back wholeheartedly.

“The cops, uh, the cops’ll just ignore you if you’re making out in some alley. Looks less suspicious than standing around with a load of spray paint cans,” He laughed awkwardly.

“Oh right, the cops, yeah,” Mac said, glancing back down the alley so he didn’t have to either look at Dennis or very obviously not look at him. “We should finish up and get out of here ‘case they come back,”

“Hm? Oh, yeah, good idea,” Dennis said, turning back to the door, movements slightly jerky and awkward. He finished painting the door in record time, shaky lines dripping down the wooden door. They grabbed the paint cans and shoved them back in the duffel bag as fast as they could and made a speedy getaway.

 

“Did you guys do it?” Charlie called from behind the pool table when Mac and Dennis finally got back to the bar.

“What, what do you mean?” Mac snapped, far too quickly. Dennis rolled his eyes at his complete lack of subtlety. 

“Did you tag the building?” Charlie said, scrunching his nose and narrowing his eyes suspiciously, “Why, what else would I be asking?”

“Nothing! We tagged the bar,” Dennis said quickly before Mac could respond, “All went fine, no problems,” Mac hummed in agreement, rubbing the back of his neck in a very not particularly reassuring way.

“Right.” Charlie glanced back and forth between the pair, a very slight smile forming on his lips; obviously completely oblivious to the situation as always, Dennis reassured himself.

“Hey, Mac why do you have paint on your cheek?”

 

They didn’t talk about the kiss for the rest of the evening. They acted the same as normal, though the air between them in the car on the way home was slightly more brittle than usual. The radio felt too quiet, and Dennis’ snide remarks about Dee felt forced to try and deflate the tense silence. He tried bringing up the plan once, but the words hung palpably in the air between them, so he didn’t speak again.

As soon as the door was shut behind them, sealing them into their apartment together the air in Dennis’ lungs seemed to turn to sludge.

“Well guess I’ll hit the hay,” Mac declared awkwardly into the silence. He hurried to his bedroom without even glancing in Dennis’ direction, slamming the door shut behind him with slightly more force than was totally necessary, leaving Dennis alone in the apartment. 

He stood there awkwardly for some time, feeling out of place in his own home. Eventually he moved to the bathroom to go about his nightly skincare routine robotically, almost as if he’d short circuited and didn’t quite know how to reboot himself, to snap himself out of this weird post-Mac haze and back into the real world.

Eventually he heard a faint click from Mac’s room, signaling he’d turned the lights out and was presumably going to get some sleep. Dennis wasn’t sure he would be able to sleep though, so he pulled out his file on Mac and sat with it in his lap for a long while, thumbing through the neatly organized pages. He stayed up until 2am, carefully detailing everything that had happened that night and Mac’s reactions to Dennis’ actions and existence in general. Once he’d gotten it all down on paper his mind felt much clearer, and he was able to go to sleep safe in the knowledge that Mac was definitely, achingly into him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is so goddamn dialogue heavy but then so is the show so it's really easy to just fall into that writing style tbh?? I hope it works for the story and doesn't just feel clunky. Please let me know your thoughts! I've hit a bit of a brick wall with motivation for this fic so any comments really help haha, hope you enjoyed it so far <3

**Author's Note:**

> Lemme tell you it's a lot harder than I expected to hit the right story and character beats when the characters were so undeveloped in season 1, so I will of course be taking some creative liberties. Mac and Dennis' relationship for one thing, I headcanon this sort of thing happening further towards season 4/5, but I wanted to play with it anyway and I make the rules so suck it. 
> 
> In case you were wondering, based on comments in season 5, they got the bar in 1998, age 22, so that's when this is set.


End file.
